Brotherly Friendship
by Alieyxa
Summary: After all, whoever said that hopes and goals had to die with friendships' A Sasuke & Naruto friendship!fic.


**Brotherly Friendship**

A Sasuke & Naruto friendship!fic. Well, sort of. It's just my own angst-ish spin on things.

---------S-A-S-U-K-E-a-n-d-N-A-R-U-T-O-----------

The wind whistled past the window that didn't close, on the one wall of Naruto's cheap, one bedroom apartment. The blonde sitting on his bed looked at his pack that was ready to go by his door. He couldn't remember feeling this alone for a long time. Ever since the day he met his 'brother', there had always been someone there, even if they didn't show it. It wasn't really a friendship…it was a mutual understanding of each other that went further than a friendship ever could. They both had nothing…but they had found something worth living for within each other.

"_Hey, why are you sitting here alone?" a blonde boy approached one with much darker hair, and sat next to him at the edge of the dock. "Shouldn't you be home by now? Look, if it's 'cause of the dark, I can go with you," he offered._

"_No one will miss me," the dark-haired boy mumbled._

"_Why not?" inquired the blonde._

"_Because my parents are dead," came the blunt reply._

_The blonde looked at the boy next to him, then stuck out his hand. "I'm Uzumaki Naruto," he said._

_The other boy hesitatingly took his hand. "Uchiha Sasuke."_

_The blonde smiled at him, and Sasuke felt a smile tug at his lips. But before it showed, it left his face._

"_What about you? Won't your parents be worried?" he asked. The blonde's face suddenly became more melancholy._

"_No one's waiting for me, either," he said. "I don't have parents, no siblings either. Never have, never will," he shrugged._

_Sasuke only nodded._

Naruto remembered that day like it was yesterday. Of course, it had been many, many yesterdays ago.

"_You're like my brother, Sasuke-chan. I was worried about you."_

Naruto remembered that day, too. It was a few weeks after they first met. He remembered Sasuke's eyes widen at the word 'brother', but Naruto had never really understood why until he learned of the Uchiha massacre, and the man who did it: Sasuke's brother, Itachi.

"_You're better than my brother, Naruto. And don't worry about me. I was just…remembering. I lost track of time. My house is full of memories…I wish it wasn't."_

That had been Sasuke's reply to him. At the time, Naruto had just nodded. After all, it was only one day that Sasuke had failed to meet him at the docks, right?

"_I'm sorry. We can't be friends anymore."_

_A young Naruto frowned. "Why not, Sasuke-chan?"_

"_Don't call me that," Sasuke said to the blonde. "I'm older than you, remember?"_

_Naruto 'humph'-ed. "Fine. Why not, Sasuke-teme?"_

"_Because I…it's complicated, Naruto."_

_Naruto opened his mouth to say something, but he had known Sasuke long enough to know it would be pointless to get into a long debate with the older boy. Instead, he simply nodded._

"_But, we can still be brothers, right?"_

_Sasuke hesitated before he answered in the affirmative. Naruto smiled held out his hand to Sasuke, just as he had done the first time they met. Sasuke had grasped it, and they shook on their agreement._

"_Good."_

Naruto sighed. '_Sasuke's about as good a brother as Itachi,'_ he thought bitterly, but immediately regretted it. Itachi. Naruto remembered how that had sparked their first real fight.

"_Hey! Wait up, Sasuke-onii!" Naruto ran after him one day after the Academy. Sasuke stopped, and waited for Naruto to fall into step beside him._

"_What is it, Naruto?" he asked boredly. It had been a particularly trying day for him, no thanks to Iruka-sensei's lesson._

"_I was just wondering…that Itachi creep Iruka was talking about today…is he your brother?"_

_Sasuke stopped and turned to face Naruto. It took a minute for him to answer, but eventually he nodded his head. "Naruto, swear you'll never say his name. Ever."_

_Now it was Naruto's turn to nod, and he didn't hesitate. He didn't want to lose his brother. "It's the promise of a lifetime, I swear."_

_Sasuke ignored him, satisfied with the answer he had received._

Naruto had only said those words twice in his lifetime. Then, and when he vowed to Sakura that he would bring Sasuke back. He had told her that he was going to do it for her, but it was for himself, too. He didn't know how long he could survive without his brother.

"But I failed," Naruto mumbled to himself. "I failed myself and Sakura-chan."

Suddenly, Naruto found himself remembering the bad times instead of the good ones. Especially one day when he had lost it completely. Naruto recalled how the villagers had been especially mean that day, and how he had run all the way to Sasuke's house to get away from them, because he knew they were scared of that part of town. That was the day the mask he used to hide himself had begun to crack. It was only a few days after they had become a genin. Naruto remembered wondering if that was why the villagers were angry.

"_Sasuke! Sasuke-onii, please open up!" Naruto banged frantically on the door. He needed to talk to someone who he knew would care, even if no emotion was shown. Sure enough, Sasuke opened to door._

"_What is it, Naruto?" Sasuke asked. He was obviously having a worse day than usual; Naruto could tell by the heavier strain on his voice._

"_I just needed to see you. You're the only one I've got. The villagers, they tried to beat me up again, but the old man stopped them--"_

"_Naruto, if you're going to complain about having no one to go to, you need to leave," Sasuke told him. "You're not the only one."_

"_Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know. Poor Sasuke-onii lost his parents and the last thing he said to his dear mummy was a sorry 'I love you, okaa,'." Naruto growled. He had come to get away from the villagers, and hopefully have a calm conversation with Sasuke. He couldn't help what he had said until it was too late. And if Sasuke wanted to argue, then who was he to stop him?_

"_Watch it, Naruto. You've got no idea how I feel."_

_Naruto snorted. "Of course not. Poor little Sasuke-onii. All alone since his parents died. At least you had parents."_

"_You don't know anything, baka," Sasuke growled. He didn't mean it, and Naruto was sure of it. But they both thought that the other needed to hear this. They couldn't keep this 'brothership' going and pretend that both their lives were great. They both knew this._

"_No, I don't. I don't know what it's like to loose a brother - and I never want to. I don't know what it's like to loose a family. Hell, I don't even know what it's like to have a family!" Naruto said angrily. "Well thanks for rubbing it in, teme!"_

_Sasuke had slammed the door in his face, and Naruto, who was beyond any anger he had ever felt, had yelled out something he would regret until he died:_

"_I hope Itachi comes back and--"_

_But he never got to finish that sentence._

_Sasuke threw the door open again and punched Naruto with a force that sent him flying backwards. Naruto wiped the blood leaking from his nose, and stalked off._

_He had broken his promise._

They hadn't talked for days after that. Not until their first mission, really. They hadn't showed that they actually cared if each other lived until Naruto had held Sasuke's body, when it closely resembled a pin-cushion, thanks to Haku. Naruto recalled how, at the time (and after that too), he hadn't been able to bear the thought of Sasuke's death. He couldn't imagine if his last really friendly words to him were, essentially, wishing that Itachi would come back and kill him too. Although both boys had known that that would never happen, it had hurt nonetheless.

They had stopped really talking after that. Only at practice and on missions, but they never met for a friendly lunch or something like they used to. They continued on existing, until everything culminated when they stood opposite each other at the Valley of the End.

"_Am i nothing to you now? Not even a comrade? Did everything we've done as team seven have no meaning to you?" Naruto yelled at Sasuke. Kyuubi's chakra was willing itself to spill out from him, but Naruto held it back. He might be mad at Sasuke, but he was his brother. And, he couldn't break a promise. He would never break a promise, ever, after what he had said to Sasuke._

"_No. It wasn't meaningless. You have always been my closest friend. You have always been my…brother," said Sasuke._

"_Then why the hell are you doing this!?"_

"_It is because you have been my closest friend…and because you have been my brother…that there is meaning in defeating you," Sasuke told Naruto, staring directly into the blonde's cerulean eyes, that glared straight back at him._

"_I don't understand what you're saying at all! The thing that I do understand, though, is that you're going to have to fight me seriously, Sasuke-teme!" cried Naruto, charging towards Sasuke._

That was a few months ago. Now, Naruto sat on his bed watching the crescent moon climb high into the night sky. He would be leaving Konoha tomorrow, too. He was going to train with Jiraiya. He was going to seek his own power, the right way, and bring his brother home. Then he would return, carrying Sasuke's barely alive body if he had to, and the village would thank him for bringing back their precious Uchiha Sasuke.

But that wasn't why he was going to do it. For once in Naruto's life, the blonde boy wasn't going to better himself for the sake of respect, the villagers, or even the affections of a pink-haired girl. No. This time, Naruto was going to better himself for himself. He was going to bring his brother home.

It wasn't the promise of a lifetime. It wasn't a pinkie-swear. It wasn't a feeble promise to leave Sasuke to his own melancholy state of self-hatred (Kami knew how many times Naruto had reluctantly made that promise). It wasn't even a vow. It was a goal. And, ask anyone: Naruto would go to hell and back to reach his goals.

And after that, he would become Hokage.

Naruto smiled a bit at this last thought. Yeah. After all, whoever said that hopes and goals had to die with friendships?

----------E-N-D-----------


End file.
